FSU Art BFA’14 Abigail Lucien was selected as a Hopper Prize winner for Spring 2021. The Hopper Prize offers an opportunity to advance the careers of artists by offering recognition and financial funding. Artists are selected for this award based on merit and quality of work. This year, the selection of winners was made by Tyler Blackwell, associate curator at the Blaffer Art Museum, and Caitlin Julia Rubin, associate curator and director of programs at the Rose Art Museum.
“Abigail Lucien is an interdisciplinary artist raised in Cap-Haitian, Haiti and Florida. Working in sculpture, poetry, video, and sound, their practice looks at ways cultural identities and inherited colonial structures transmit to the body and psyche by challenging systems of assimilation through material. Lucien was named to the 2021 Forbes 30 Under 30 list, is a recipient of a 20-21 VMFA Fellowship, and is the 2020 Harpo Emerging Artist Fellow. Lucien is currently based in Baltimore, MD where they teach full-time in the Interdisciplinary Sculpture department at MICA.”
For this award, Abigail Lucien submitted a detailed portfolio of their work along with supplementary materials. Lucien describes their work in her artist statements as “Part familiar, part foreign, the works employ an architectural vernacular – challenging systems of assimilation through material and analyzing systems of care through sculpture.”
Throughout Lucien’s work they use their Haitian-American background to ground their work around the exploration of intersectional issues and what it means to grow up with a bicultural identity in America. For more information about Abigail’s work, please visit her website.